Stripping +Staining = Beauty

After watching a few episodes of TLC's Cash & Cari, I developed a love for antique furniture that had been restored to its original beauty. Some pieces however, were painted in a shabby chick style, which personally I love so much that if I were single and living alone my pad would be decorated in such matter!! So after browsing the internet for these beautiful antique/vintage restored/ painted pieces I decided that I would take on the challenge of refurnishing a piece! I searched for days, weeks for a piece that I liked and that wasn't to pricey to redo and if it failed it wouldn't hurt my wallet as bad if I ended up tossing it! After searching I found this vintage dresser. I was smitten by its curves and elegant look. I called the seller and I just couldn't wait to get my hands on it!



There it was, this worn piece with stickers on its face, scratches on it top, missing a detail piece from the bottom, missing knobs and I could help but to fall in love and look at its potential! I quickly offered her $60 and she took it! It was mine! Loaded it to the car and brought it home! I Google-d, YouTube-d and Yahoo-ed How-to videos on refinishing and shortly after I was out the door to buy my supplies. I worked on it for 3 days. Stripping it down to the bare wood. Filling in the chips and scratches as much I could, sanding and washing it to make sure the wood was clean and ready to absorb its new stain. I removed the bottom piece and knobs, left it as bare as I could get it. To my surprise I fell in love with the cottage feel it had and almost felt tempted to leave it as such.



I asked my friends what they thought, leave it or stain it. We all opted for staining! So, I stained it Mahogany Red. It quickly absorbed the stain and I let it sit for a while so that it would have a rich deep red color, later I removed all the excess stain let it dry for about 24 hours before applying the polyurethane to get it to the final gloss I wanted! It was beautiful!!!



It now sits in my office area, awaiting its now knobs which took me forever to find and its a piece in my house that demands attention! Not to shabby for my first time, huh?! :)